Dallas/Ft. Worth Shows

I hadn't been to Hyenas in Dallas or Ft. Worth since I started school, so I decided to take a trip out there after the Fall semester this year. (I got all A's in five classes, just to brag a little bit!) Both Hyena's clubs are among my favorites that I've worked at, crowds are always great, and I love the cities. And I always get to hang out with Jason Russell while I'm out there, he's a good buddy of mine that I met back in 2002 when I did a guest set while he headlined at Laffs here in Albuquerque. (RIP) Jason was also headlining the first time I ever emceed a week at Laffs.

I was excited to work with Ben Creed again, I have done shows with him in Tucson and Colorado Springs, he's one of my favorite headliners to work with, super cool guy and hilarious. My buddy, James Morrow and I drove in to Fort Worth on Thursday to catch the open mic at the club. I hadn't been to the new location, so it was a little different than I was expecting. We got there just in time to sign up, there weren't many comics there. I did run into Kyle Reade, who I've known for years, he just moved to Dallas from Tucson. They're treating him like a new guy out there which kind of sucks, Kyle's been doing it for quite awhile and he's good. Hopefully he'll catch a break and get some solid stage time at the clubs. I wasn't too impressed with the open mic, but it was cool for James to get some stage time out of town.

The new club was a lot different than the previous one, it is located in the Lonestar club downtown. It was a great location, but just didn't have the feel of the old club. The first night's shows weren't too bad, I had to shake some rust off, I hadn't featured at a club in several months. The opening act was Clint Werth, a local guy who's been doing stand-up a couple of years. He had some great stuff and got the crowd going right away which was nice. My best shows of the week were definitely the Saturday shows though. Late show Saturday there was a man in the front row who looked like the Gorton's Fisherman, minus the raincoat. I made fun of him quite a bit in my set and he loved it. It was fun watching Ben, he destroyed every show!

The following weekend I was in Dallas performing with headliner Aaron Aryanpur. I had never heard of him, but I had heard that he just won the Funniest Comic in Texas competition at the Improv, which is pretty big. The opening act for the weekend was Chris Corlea, who's also pretty new to stand-up, but he has some solid material. I think he's going to be really good when he gets more comfortable on stage and writes more. I wasn't sure what to expect of Aaron since I had never seen him or heard of him, but he did just win that competition, so I knew he had to be pretty solid, and he was. A lot of jokes about his family and marriage, he's a little older than me, and has been doing stand-up for about as long as well. He was great to work with, very humble, very friendly and funny. I think he'll do some great things in comedy. Very likable. On Friday and Saturday Paul Varghese did guest sets, I'm not gonna lie, I was a little nervous to follow him, even though I had never seen him before. I had heard of him, and I am friends with him on Facebook. Every time I'm in Dallas I hear his name from the local comics, a lot of guys look up to him, and I can see why now that I got to see him perform. He was great, I would love to see him do a full headlining set. Very cleverly written material, crowd loved it. And he was super cool as well, he told me he does mostly college gigs which is great way to make money in this business. The crowds were good all weekend long, a little strange at times and kind of had trouble with some of the more clever material. But, overall, I was happy with my performances. It was nice to get out on the road for a couple of weeks during Christmas break.

I have a weekend coming in Tucson and after that nothing until Spring semester is over, I'll be in Colorado for three weeks in May! Looking forward to that. Until then, I'm going to keep writing and hopefully be able to come up with some great material. Happy New Year everyone!

What's Been Going On and Shit

Well, since the new semester started in August I haven't been on the road much. I feature at Loonees Comedy Corner in Colorado Springs the week before school started with Adam Cayton-Holland, if you haven't seen him, check him out, very funny dude from Denver. And he's a huge baseball fan, which makes him cooler. Had a pretty fun week, shows weren't packed or anything, but always a good time.

In October, I opened at Laffs Comedy Club in Tucson. The feature was my former roommate, Jake Sharon, and the headliner was Steven Michael Quezada. Steven wanted to work with me, so I decided I would take an mc week and go have fun for a weekend in Tucson. The shows were great! It was awesome seeing Jake again, too. Steven took a lot pics with fans after the shows, that was cool. He's had a lot of success being on "Breaking Bad!"

November 3 we had a really cool show in Albuquerque at The Box. Five comics each did ten minutes, the first five minutes were the first five minutes they had ever written and the final five were their newest five. It went pretty well. I hadn't told those jokes in years, it was kind of find to tell those shitty jokes in front of an audience again.

My wife, Caitlin, had her first comedy gig November 10th at The Box as the guest comic for Comedy?'s Variety show! She was so nervous, but she did great, and she did it with no notes! She also got to do a little improv with them, which was really cool. They let me do an improv game with them when I performed for them in September, but I did horrible. Caitlin has an improv show on the 30th at Tech Love, which I'm excited about!

Next month will be fun, I get to perform at Hyenas in Dallas and Fort Worth with one of my favorite comics, Ben Creed! I haven't been out there in over a year, so I'm pretty excited to get out there. It'll be a nice little break from school, too. And as far as school goes, so far I have 4 A's and a B right now, so hopefully I can keep that up until the end of the semester.

Ron Ferguson headlines 405 Lounge Wednesday July 25 at 830

With Laffs Comedy Club closing down a few years ago, not many nationally touring comics have stopped through the Duke City. But this week, we are lucky enough to have one of my favorite comics and good friend, Ron Ferguson in town. He will be headlining at the 405 Lounge downtown at 830 on Wednesday night, tickets are only 5 bucks at the door. Part of the proceeds will go to children who lost their parent or parents in the Aurora shooting this past weekend, which is where Ron is from.

Ron is a regular at the world famous Comedy Works in Denver, and has shared the stage with such heavyweights as Bill Burr, Dave Chappelle and Chelsea Handler. He currently tours with Pablo Francisco, but is taking a week off to come hang out in Albuquerque. Check out Ron's website also, you can catch a video or two of his on youtube if you want, but live comedy is the way to go, so get your asses to the show.

Also joining Ferguson on stage will be local comics Ariel Holmes, Sarah Mowrey, Rusty Rutherford, and Curt Fletcher (me!)

Walt White and the dead body

Sunday afternoon I flew back into town after a great two weeks at the Loony Bins in Little Rock and Tulsa, respectively. Like I mentioned in my last post, I worked with some great comics, and had some pretty solid crowds. Made a lot of new fans in Tulsa, especially, love that place!

I had a few hours to unpack and everything before my show at Route 66 Casino's Envy Nightclub with Steven Michael Quezada, who plays Gomez on "Breaking Bad." Ever heard of it? He's also the host of a local tv talk show, "The After After Party" which he's invited me to do three times! It's been great exposure, and it's always a blast. The crew, and The James Douglas Show are all amazing!

I got to the venue around 7:45, talked to the mc, Nikki Mangin, and talked to Steven briefly before the show started. It was a nice turn out for a Sunday night, not to mention they were having the service for Johnny Tapia at the Pit, too. I was pretty happy with the turn out. About 15 minutes before I was going to hit the stage, I was standing over near the stage entrance and decided I needed some more water. I looked over at the bar and saw a well dressed bald man standing and taking pictures with people, even though his back was turned I knew it was Bryan Cranston.

Having been in the business for ten plus years, I rarely get nervous before a show, but seeing Walt fucking White at the show, I got pretty damn nervous. Luckily, I had just done two straight weeks(and one gay, hahaha) on the road and had my set down pretty solid. I took the stage and did a pretty solid job, not a big crowd for laughter, but everyone was enjoying themselves. There was one guy that was laughing every time I looked at him, and that was Bryan Cranston! I thought that was pretty damn cool!

Nikki and Steven both rocked as usual, too. I also met Double J, from 106.3 in the mornings, and he invited me to go on his show Monday morning. I almost declined because it was so early, but couldn't turn down the exposure!

So, after the show at the casino, I was walking out of the building and there were some cops and an ambulance or two, I don't really remember. There was a little fenced off area with some sheets wrapped around, but it was kind of windy and I happened to glance over and saw a body laying on the ground with a sheet trying to cover it up. Not sure what the hell happened, but it kinda freaked me the fuck out. So, a pretty solid night, Bryan Cranston laughed at my jokes, and I saw a dead body. And Nikki and Steven were bad ass, always fun working with them!

Now, I get to relax and hang with the wifey for a few days! She's starting her new improv class this Saturday, she's super excited!! I'll make sure to post when her next show is.

And I am starting my new open mic show tonight at the 405 Lounge on Central! Never ran my own show before, pretty excited to have comedy downtown!

Being on the road

Since starting school in January, I haven't really hit the road much this year. The only times I've been out are for the Laughing Skull Festival in Hollywood and Atlanta. Last week was my first week on the road for 2012, I was in Little Rock, Arkansas, at the Loony Bin. I hadn't been there in about four years, and actually kind of struggled when I emceed there. It was a pretty slow week because of the local Riverfest going on, but the crowds were great, had a lot of fun. A lot better than when I was an opener there. Our opener for the week was Steven Baucom from Tulsa, really funny kid, has some great writing. I think he's gonna do pretty well in the business. The headliner was Skip Clark, who I had never met before. He's only been doing stand up for seven years and already headlining, pretty solid! Both guys were super cool to work with. This week I've been in Tulsa, which is one of my favorite places to be. Got to hang out with my good buddy, Jason Brown, and play some strat-o-matic baseball, or as Dave Ashley calls it, nerd baseball. I played strato growing up, and thought it was cool that Jason did, too. So, every time we get together we draft some teams and play a series or two, it's a blast! The shows in Tulsa have been a lot of fun so far, too. Dave Testroet, is the headliner, he's a great guy, I've worked with him a ton. The opener is a local guy, Dan Fritschie, very funny guy! Friday morning we did a radio interview on 106.9, the dj's were super cool, had a fun time there making fun of Dave. It's good to get back on the road, I miss the shit out of it! Tomorrow I'm doing a show at the Route 66 Casino in Albuquerque with Steven Michael Quezada, should be a lot of fun. R.I.P. Johnny Tapia

Rise Against Show/My Upcoming Shows

I haven't been to many concerts in the last couple of years, I used to go quite a bit when I was younger. I guess I have other stuff to spend money on, and I'd rather be on stage if I can be. Last Monday, my step dad hooked me and Caitlin up with free tickets to see Rise Against at the Santa Ana Star Center in Rio Rancho. We got out of our math class early and headed down there. We got to sit up in one of the suites, which was pretty cool, had a nice view of the stage. The first band was Title Fight, never heard of them, we caught a few of their last songs, they weren't bad. Second, was A Day to Remember. I had just heard them on the radio earlier that day, and they sounded pretty decent. I was pretty impressed with their live show, it's amazing how creative a band can get when they've got a little bit of money. They put on a really good show, I don't know if I'd go out and buy their album, but it was a lot of fun to watch. Rise Against headlined the show, and they put on an amazing live show. Had really cool lighting and some awesome videos playing on stage. Singer, Tim McIlrath, also did a few acoustic songs, those were the first Rise Against songs I had ever heard, so that was pretty cool! It was a lot of fun. On Saturday the 28th I did a show at Hotel Andaluz for 93.3 KOB FM to raise money for YDI. This is one the best shows I've seen here in Albuquerque for awhile, we had Todd Badolato, Sarah Kennedy, Dan Rascon, Matt Peterson, Rusty Rutherford and me. They packed a lot of people into the room, the lighting was great, too. Everybody killed it, very successful night! Here are some of my upcoming shows May 5: Albuquerque, NM-Reptilian Lounge 10:30 pm This show is put on by Tricklock Theatre Co May 23-26: Little Rock, AR-Loony Bin May 30-June 2: Tulsa, OK-Loony Bin June 3: Albuquerque, NM-Route 66 Casino w/Steven Michael Quezada

Laughing Skull Festival and new cd recording

I haven't had much time to blog, or really do anything since I got home from Atlanta. Finishing up my first semester at Central New Mexico Community College, my last day is Monday! So relieved to have this first semester out of the way. Well, the Laughing Skull Festival in Atlanta was quite an experience. I was amazed at the amount of talent in the competition. There were a lot of great headliners in the competition. I knew I had no chance of winning up against some of these guys, but it was an honor to be a part of it. I got to hang out with a lot of my favorite comics that I hadn't seen in awhile, too, like Gabe Rutledge, Mark Poolos, and Johnny Beehner. I shared a hotel with three guys from LA, Alex Hooper, Grant Lyon, and Mark Agee. I had only met them all once, but they were all cool guys. And as a comic I always live with people I've never met before, so it's not a huge deal at all, we had a good time. Those guys are extremely funny, too! My portion of the competition was the first show of the week at the Laughing Skull Lounge. I didn't get a chance to catch everyone's set from backstage, but listened to pretty much everyone, definitely a lot of talent. I had a pretty solid set, but didn't advance. My feelings weren't hurt though, any of the comics could have advanced from that show. My buddy, Justin Clutter, who's been one of my best friends since 4th grade was at the show. He lives a couple hours north of Atlanta, so he came down to the show. The last time I saw him was a week after the Colts beat the Bears in the Super Bowl and we hung out with Dallas Clark's dad, Doug. Funny dude! Thursday night I got to perform a couple shows at the Hotel Midtown which is where we stayed. The shows were pretty fun, got to try some stuff that I didn't do in the competition round. We went to the Clermont Lounge afterwards, holy shit! I kind of had a feeling of what we were getting in to, but the first thing I saw when I walked in was Blondie, nasty chick with nasty boobs. She wasn't even the nastiest one either, there was a 65-year-old stripper! Finally, there was one decent looking stripper, I was thinking, "how the hell did she end up here?" Then she lit her nipples on fire. Pretty interesting night. Friday, I had the night off, so I decided to chill at the hotel, watched the shows there then hung out with Mark Poolos. And I ate almost an entire pizza by myself. I felt good. Saturday was the night of the semifinals and finals in the competition. I watched part of the semifinals at the hotel, then grabbed a cab over to the Relapse Theater to see if I could get on stage since some of the comics made the finals. I was able to get a 5 minute set, which was awesome! The Relapse is a really cool improv theater in the basement of an old church. I got to see Sean Kent perform, too, I hadn't seen him in a few years since he was at Laffs. Dude is fuckin hilarious! I had a pretty solid set at the Relapse, it was fun. I met a lot of cool people in Atlanta, lots of great comics and industry people. I definitely want to try to get in the festival again next year, Steve Hofstetter and Marshall Chiles were both super cool! It was a good motivation for me being out there with all of that talent. I've been kind of lazy with the comedy the last year or so. Not good. When I got back from Albuquerque, I had a gig at Malarkey's. Had a kick ass headline set, had a lot of fun there. Felt good about my set, wasn't sure how I'd do after traveling all day. On April 20th, I decided to record for my live cd, "Fletcher in the Rye" (take that jd salinger) Had a fun night at the Guild Theater in Albuquerque, very kick ass lineup! We've got a lot of great comics here in Albuquerque. Tonight is gonna be an awesome show at Hotel Andaluz, doing a show to help raise money for YDI. Looking forward to the show.